Summer break was finally here (which is only a week long)! We had so much we wanted to see and do, and I think we got through everything! We saw some national parks, amazing cities, and historical relics. We had a blast! We took plenty of photos and made some great memories! Gyeongju National Park 07.28.2018 Highlights: This is a Historical National Park and considered to be an outdoor museum with dozens of temples, buddahs, statues, pagodas, and various other ancient artifacts. These are spread around 3 or 4 separate parks and mountain areas throughout the greater Gyeonju area. There are some hiking trails connecting many of them, but from what we hiked and saw, none of the hiking is very strenuous or too demanding. We were decked out in our full hiking gear, but would have been comfortable in regular shoes and no poles. If you are interested in spending a day outside and seeing ancient Korean history stuff, I think you’d really enjoy yourself all over this historical park. What we saw: We parked the car and started the hike at Bulguksa Temple since it is the largest and most popular temple in the area. After experiencing the Temple, there is a relatively easy 3-4km hike up the hill to the Seokguram Grotto. I won’t go into all the details and history of these places since there is a plethora of websites that can do it for you. I will say that the Temple and Grotto were incredibly beautiful and seeing the ancient stone carvings and structures like these is very enjoyable. We got back in the car at Bulguksa Temple and drove 25-30 minutes to Wolji Pond and started our second sight-seeing tour here. We cruised around Gyeongju Donggung Palace and walked over to the larger park area that has Cheomseongdae Observatory and Inwangdong Ancient Tombs. We just walked a big circle and took in the beauty of the landscape and surrounding mountains. We felt lucky when a bunch of rain clouds blew in and it tried to rain, but didn’t quiet make it. The dark grey clouds just cooled everything off and gave us some much-needed rest from the relentless summer sun. Woraksan National Park 07.29.2018 Highlights: This is a small National Park and it doesn’t seem to get too much attention, but what a gem of a mountain this place is. Just look at the summit pictures: 360 degree unobstructed views. After a strenuous climb up from the valley, there is a relatively flat and very breezy ridge line to enjoy. The final stair accent twists up the side a near vertical crag and you can enjoy the growing scenic view at every zig-zag along the way. Woraksan National Park was one of our top 3 favorite national parks. We hope you can make it there yourself! The Trailhead: We started the hike at Deokjusa Temple. We’ve learned that starting hikes at temple sites is usually advantageous because there are bathrooms, good parking, and little food and drink shops if you need any last-minute things for the trail. Unfortunately, Deokjusa Temple was a little underwhelming. It appeared as though the temple had funding to build a nice big facility, but then construction was stopped a few years back. There was a nice bathroom and fresh water spring so we'd still recommend started from this point since there was plenty of parking and the trail access is good. The Accent: The first 1.0km (yellow trail) to the temple is nice and easy. The next 1.6km (orange trail) is a rock-stair and dirt climb, but is well shaded and you can listen to the sounds of forest. Once you hit the 0.9km (purple trail) be ready for a challenging sun exposed stair climb straight up the bowl from the valley. There are several good view points to take a breather and take-in the shapes and colors of the park. You can also see the huge Yeongbong Peak crag bursting straight out of the earth. It is a massive vertical rock face covered with wavy layers where parts of the rock have eroded off. What a sight to see! There is a big relief once you hit the 0.9 + 0.7km (orange trail) ridge line. You’ll be blasted by a cool refreshing breeze (maybe freezing cold wind in the winter) and be treated to smooth rolling ridgeline trail that is not too rocky. The last 0.8km (purple trail) is a crazy big staircase climb that twists and zigs-zags all to the summit of Yeongbong. This climb will take some energy, but since we were so close to the summit and seeing growing views of the distant valleys and peaks, our energy level stayed high. The Summit: Yeongbong (1097M) offered one of the best long-distance landscape views we’ve seen in all the national parks. Being perched on top of a huge exposed vertical crag, we got to see an amazing 360 degree view. You’ll see the turquoise blues and emerald greens of Chungjuho Lake, and are surrounded by the rest of Workasan National Park that stretches out in the distance. This was truly a view to remember. The Descent: The 0.9km and 0.7km are an out and back from the summit climb. We opted to take the 1.6km + 1.2km (purple trail) decent just to mix it up from doing a full out and back on the same trails. First 1.6km is a long rock-stair descent through the shady forest. And the last 1.6km is mix of rock stair, and dirt decent, but nothing too back-breaking. We ended up walking the road for 2.4km (grey trail) back to our car. There is a walking path that parallels the flowing stream. Since we did the hike during summer break, there were 100’s of Korean families enjoying the cool water and having cook-outs along the way. There is a bus that runs along this road, but there were no timetables posted at the stops, so we weren’t sure how often it ran. Hallyeohaesang National Park 07.30.2018 Highlights: Hallyeohaesang National Park is broken up and sprinkled across several southern pennisulas and islands. With a mountain top temple that overlooks the ocean and dozens of surrounding islands, the long drive and short hike was well worth it. Just behind the bathroom building at the trailhead, was a small house that had 4-5 goats living out back. One goat had managed to slip and fall down the retaining wall and was stuck in the ditch. We went to the National Park information center and effectively communicated the problem (google translate via phone) to the National Park employee. He jumped up and ran over to the bathroom building to see for himself. He quickly grabbed the goat’s lead rope and ushered it along the ditch and back around the side of the farm house to safety. So, not only did we do an awesome hike, we helped a goat too. The Trailhead: We started the hike at Geumsan Visiting Information Center, which offered shaded parking and a nice bathroom facility. The trailhead started just around the right side of bathroom house. This trail is only 2.2km, but it goes straight up the mountain. The Accent: The first .5km (green/orange trail) is a gradual climb on a nice wide, stony trail. Once you reach the purple trail section, the stone and log steps begin and they don’t let up. The trail is mostly shaded and offers good protection from the sun. This was a good thing since it was 31C/90F with 100% humidity. We had already hiked the previous two days, so our legs were a bit fatigued when we started. Regardless, we enjoyed the trail and all the beauty of the surrounding forest. Near the summit, is a cave that gives a wonderful view of the ocean and islands below. There is a wonderful breeze blowing through it that cooled us off and refreshed us a after the short, but steep climb up. The Summit: The trail continued a short distance from the cave to the summit of Geumsan and the Boriam Temple site. The temple gave more spectacular views of the ocean and island communities below. I think we spent as much time taking pictures and staring at the view as we did hiking. There is a gift shop that sells cold drinks, so we each enjoyed a bottle of our favorite sugary drink, Toreta (this is like a Gatorade/Powerade sports drink). There is a small network of trails along the summit that take you to different lookout points and shrines. We made a good loop out of these trails and connected back into the same trail we accented. The Descent: We came down the same trail we climbed up since it is the only trail on the south side of the mountain. It was a little quicker going down, but with all the stone and log steps, it was still an effort to make down. Once we got back to the car, we drove to the Daeraengi Village. We drove along the scenic belt road that looped the island. The Daeraengi Village has terraced rice padi right along the coast, so we got some beautiful pictures and took a wonderful hour-long stroll through this area. We would have stayed longer, but it was time to start our long drive back to Cheonan. Deogyusan National Park 08.01.2018 It was the first day of August (and another hot day on our summer break), but nevertheless, we decided to welcome the new month with yet another hike! We really couldn’t lay out any official plans since it has been so hot here. So each morning we opened up the Weather App and picked the national park that was the “coolest.” On this specific day, Deogyusan National Park was the “coolest.” And by “coolest” we mean it wasn’t 100 degrees. We arrived at the trailhead between 9:30 and 10. We could feel the humidity pushing down on us, but we made it this far, so we booted up and started onward. The first part of the trail was nice. It followed a pleasant stream and was shaded! Phew! But, in true Korean fashion, the nice, pleasant hike quickly turned into a straight up scramble of rocks followed by a lengthy stair climb. Up up, up we went. We came upon a fellow Korean hiker who kept telling us to drink lots of water. We assured him we were and continued with the ascent. We finally made it to Chilbong Peak! Yet, it was somewhat anticlimactic. It was actually just a helicopter landing area, which meant no trees, which meant no shade. It was steamy hot! We took a quick picture and quickly moved on so we could get into the shade! We started the traverse over to Seolcheonbong Peak. The ridgeline was a bit overgrown with bamboo grass, but it was nothing that couldn’t be handled. All of a sudden we popped out onto what looked like a fire road. We quickly realized this was one of the ski slope runs on the mountain. We had heard there was a ski resort on the mountain but we didn’t realize we would be hiking up a run! It was gorgeous, but exposed. We started up the hill, and soon came across a pleasant surprise. We knew the ski lift ran during the summer, but we didn’t know there was a nice little lodge that was going to be open. We made it to the lift and gladly bought some drinks and sat in the cold aircon to cool off for a while. After some amazing cool drinks, we were reenergized and ready to go! Our next stop was Hyangjeokbong, which stands at 1,614m. It was a quick traverse over to the peak and before we knew it, we had made it! We didn’t spend too much time at the peak, since we wanted to make it down at a decent time. On the loop down, we stopped by Osujagul Cave. There was a sign near the cave that said a monk once lived there. Huh, who knew! Before we knew it, we were at the last temple of the hike, Baengnyeonsa Temple. It was a very quiet and pretty temple. People do temple stays here, and after walking through the grounds I can see why. The final 5km stretch back was a dirt road and super easy to walk, but was welcomed. Yes! Another Korean national park in the books! Damyang and Unjusa 08.02.2018 Since we had done a strenuous hike the day before, and it was really hot, we decided to do a sightseeing day! We had watched a mini-series on Netflix called “Korea from Above.” It had talked about a really cool, old temple called Unjusa Temple. This temple is really hard to get to by public transit and since we had a car we figured, why not!? The temple is famous because at one time there was over 1,000 Buddha and pagoda statues. Currently, only 94 Buddha statues remain, and 21 pagodas, but wow, was it really neat to see! Historians have no idea how the statues got dispersed, but they are still finding statues in random places around the area. We wondered around the temple and saw so many statues! And more and more statues! After about two hot hours at the temple, we decided it was time to head to the nearby town of Damyang to see the bamboo forest and the Metasequoia Lined Road. We did a loop through the bamboo forest and a quick walk to the Metasequoia Lined Road. It was really hot though and after a few more hours of being out and about, we decided it was time to head back to the comfort of the air-conditioned car and drive home. Tongyeong 08.04.2018 On our final Saturday during summer break, it was unbearable hot all over the country, so we knew hiking was out of the question. After some deliberation, we decided to visit a small town called Tongyeong. We had seen amazing pictures Tongyeong and it was also featured on the “Korea From Above” series. After almost a 3.5-hour drive, we finally made it! It was blistering hot, but we were well prepared with our sunscreen, umbrellas, and abundance of water. We first headed over to Mireuksan Mountain. We opted for the cable car up and we were not disappointed by the views. We read on a clear day you can see Japan’s Tsushima Island. I don’t think we were able to see the island, but to tell you the truth; it was so hot I didn’t even bother to look for it. After a small walk around the top of the mountain we went back down via the cable car. We then did what is called the Skyline Luge. You take a chairlift up a mountain with a go-cart like thing strapped to the bottom of the chairlift. There are two tracks that twist and turn and bump down the mountain, and each track is about 2 lanes wide and 1 mile long. It was a blast. We had so much fun! We got to go three times and each time was awesome! Next we went over to walk the first undersea tunnel in Asia. I mean, it was a tunnel, but to think that it was built sometime in the earlier 1900s is pretty impressive. After that we went and checked out the turtle ships. This is really what Tongyeong is famous for. The Turtle Ships are naval ships created by Admiral Yi Sun-Shin in the early 15 century. It really is considered the first armored ship in the world. Admiral Yi is famous for the Battle of Myeongnyang, which occurred on October 26, 1597. He had only thirteen ships and he somehow fought off 120-130 Japanese ships. I have to say he was a pretty cool guy. Lastly, we went over to Yi Sun-Shin Park to get a picture of his statue overlooking the ocean. Man! What a day! Well, that's all for now! Here is BTS again with their new hit that now has the record having the most watches in 24 hours. It's called IDOL. It's not my jam, but clearly I am not in the majority. Sorry T. Swift. Enjoy!
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